Wash. Choice Proposals Go Down to Defeat

Organizers of two school choice initiatives in Washington state say
that after last week's defeats, they will focus on getting a charter
school law passed in the next legislative session.

School choice supporters stopped short of calling the failure of the
state's voucher and charter school initiatives by a 2-1 ratio a setback
for the movement nationally.

"I don't think that many choice advocates were looking at Washington
state," said Jeanne Allen, the president of the Center for Education
Reform, a Washington, D.C., group that supports vouchers and other
forms of choice. "It was not a viable effort, and it was not thought
through."

But the defeat of Washington's voucher proposal is the fourth time
such a plan has failed on a statewide ballot since 1991. Such
initiatives have also been voted down in Oregon, Colorado, and
California.

To opponents of vouchers, the results speak for themselves.

"Every single time the general public has had an opportunity to vote
on this issue, they have rejected vouchers. They want to see us improve
public schools," said Robert F. Chase, the president of the National
Education Association. "I hope that policymakers are listening."

The NEA's state affiliate in Washington was the major contributor to
the campaign to defeat the voucher and charter initiatives.

Joe Nathan, the director of the Center for School Change at the
University of Minnesota and the author of a recent charter school
analysis, said he doesn't think school choice measures will ever be
passed by a direct vote of citizens.

Two-Thirds Opposed

The unions and other education groups have "demonstrated that they
are willing to spend millions of dollars to defeat school choice
proposals," he said. "They can mobilize."

Sixty-six percent of Washington state voters said no to both choice
proposals on the Nov. 5 ballot. Opponents of the voucher and charter
initiatives argued that the proposals would have lowered standards for
students and given the proposed charter and "voucher redeeming" schools
broad flexibility without much accountability. ("Under New Budget, Charter Schools Cash
In," Oct. 30, 1996.)

Some also said the initiatives were poorly worded and confusing.

"If we were going to go back to the voters with it, I think I would
make it even shorter," said Ron Taber, a businessman and unsuccessful
candidate for state schools superintendent who used more than $250,000
of his own money to get the voucher initiative on the ballot. He added
that the next time around, he would limit the plan to low-income
children rather than pushing for a statewide plan.

State lawmakers in Wisconsin and Ohio have created pilot voucher
programs for poor children in Milwaukee and Cleveland.

The Washington voucher proposal, known as Initiative 173, would have
given families scholarships equal to at least 55 percent of the state's
per-pupil spending for the previous school year. Based on a current
average per-student cost of $6,000, each voucher would have amounted to
about $3,400.

Public and nonreligious private schools could have converted to
qualify as voucher-redeeming charter schools.

The separate charter proposal was largely the work of Jim and Fawn
Spady, Seattle parents and small-business owners who took out a loan
against their house to help finance the initiative.

But as the race unfolded, they were no match for the dozens of
statewide organizations that made up the No on 173 and 177
Committee.

"We will proceed to rally the troops and take it to Olympia," said
Liz Holohan, who worked for the Spadys' Education Excellence Coalition.
"Charters will not go away."

Not 'True' Charters?

The Spady plan was different from charter school laws that have
passed elsewhere in the country in that it called for local voters to
decide whether to create "renewed school districts" in which nonprofit
organizations could operate independent public schools. These schools
would have been exempt from most state education policies, regulations,
and standards.

One reason many charter advocates don't feel wounded by the defeat
in Washington is that they don't think the plan would have created true
charter schools.

"It didn't have a contract for results," one of the critical
elements in other charter school laws, Mr. Nathan said.

Marc Dean Millot, a senior social scientist in the Washington, D.C.
office of the RAND Corp., said he felt the Spadys stretched the meaning
of charter schools too far. Their proposal ended up looking more like
"voucher schools," because the independent schools would only have been
required to adhere to essentially the same regulations governing
private schools in the state, he said.

If Washington state enacts a charter law, it could look different
from the Spadys' version.

Terry Bergeson, elected state schools superintendent last week, said
she supports charter schools and will try again with lawmakers who were
close to getting a law passed this year.

The state's Democratic governor-elect, Gary Locke, has also said he
would like lawmakers to address the issue.

Considering that Ms. Bergeson is a former president of the
Washington Education Association, it is unlikely that her plan would
resemble the proposal that the state's voters rejected.

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